How The Only Coup D'Etat In U.S. History Unfolded
NPR
Weekend Edition Sunday, August 17, 2008 · Think of a coup d'etat and images of a far-flung banana republic likely come to mind. So it might come as a surprise that it happened here in the United States — just once, in 1898.
A mob of white supremacists armed with rifles and pistols marched on City Hall in Wilmington, N.C., on Nov. 10 and overthrew the elected local government, forcing both black and white officials to resign and running many out of town. The coup was the culmination of a race riot in which whites torched the offices of a black newspaper and killed a number of black residents. No one is sure how many African-Americans died that day, but some estimates say as many as 90 were killed.
"Some of the elderly African-Americans told my stepfather that the Cape Fear River was running red with blood," Bertha Todd, a teacher, recalls in producer Alan Lipke's documentary series, "Between Civil War and Civil Rights."
Especially chilling was the fact that the insurgency had been carefully planned — a conspiracy by powerful white Democrats.
Southern Democrats lost their grip on power in North Carolina in 1894 and plotted to wrest control from the biracial Republican Party in 1898 elections. They campaigned on a platform of white supremacy and protecting their women from black men.
As the Nov. 8, 1898, vote approached, whites in Wilmington mobilized. They held supremacist rallies and parades and organized militias of "Red Shirts" to intimidate blacks from voting. The statewide election restored Democrats to power, and two days later, the white supremacists descended on Wilmington's City Hall.
(Continued here.)
Weekend Edition Sunday, August 17, 2008 · Think of a coup d'etat and images of a far-flung banana republic likely come to mind. So it might come as a surprise that it happened here in the United States — just once, in 1898.
A mob of white supremacists armed with rifles and pistols marched on City Hall in Wilmington, N.C., on Nov. 10 and overthrew the elected local government, forcing both black and white officials to resign and running many out of town. The coup was the culmination of a race riot in which whites torched the offices of a black newspaper and killed a number of black residents. No one is sure how many African-Americans died that day, but some estimates say as many as 90 were killed.
"Some of the elderly African-Americans told my stepfather that the Cape Fear River was running red with blood," Bertha Todd, a teacher, recalls in producer Alan Lipke's documentary series, "Between Civil War and Civil Rights."
Especially chilling was the fact that the insurgency had been carefully planned — a conspiracy by powerful white Democrats.
Southern Democrats lost their grip on power in North Carolina in 1894 and plotted to wrest control from the biracial Republican Party in 1898 elections. They campaigned on a platform of white supremacy and protecting their women from black men.
As the Nov. 8, 1898, vote approached, whites in Wilmington mobilized. They held supremacist rallies and parades and organized militias of "Red Shirts" to intimidate blacks from voting. The statewide election restored Democrats to power, and two days later, the white supremacists descended on Wilmington's City Hall.
(Continued here.)
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